Image caption
The road-roller arrived in Australia from China in September

Australian police say they have seized drugs worth almost a quarter of a billion dollars smuggled from China inside heavy machinery.

Police seized 235kg of methamphetamine and 115kg of cocaine with an estimated value of A$237m ($246, £154m) in the operation in Sydney.

The drugs came into the country concealed in a road-roller.

Two men, an American and a Canadian, have been charged in connection with the case.

The seizure followed a "complex and protracted" police investigation that began in May 2010 targeting "an international organised crime syndicate", a police statement said.

"On 21 September 2012 the AFP (Australian Federal Police) identified a shipping container arriving in Australia, from China into Port Botany," David Sharpe of the Serious and Organised Crime Unit told a news conference.

"A search of this container identified a 20-tonne road-roller inside. On 17 November the AFP executed five search warrants across Sydney. At one of the search warrants, executed on a storage unit in a northern Sydney suburb, the AFP recovered the 20-tonne road-roller as well as 13 sports bags."

The bags contained a total of 350kg of drugs, he said.

It is the second major seizure announced by Australian police this month.

Last week, police said 200kg of cocaine with a value of A$116m had been found on a grounded boat off the coast of Tonga, following a joint operation with the US, Tonga and the Cook Islands.